Using Mesa to run OpenGL Remotely

(Thanks to Alex Roetter for writing this up!)

Note: We won't be able to support this or answer questions about it,
but are providing this info since it will probably be useful.

For a while I was trying to be able to display OpenGL programs remotely,
which is complicated by the use of GLX extensions. I finally figured it
out, and thought that it might be useful for other students...

However, a pre-built version of the libraries for SGI can be found on the
leland systems at ~aroetter/public/lib.

Since GL is linked in dynamically, you can override the order in which the
system searches for libraries to have it find the Mesa libraries first, so
it will run with those (and hence display anywhere). To do this, copy the
Mesa libraries into some directory, and then set up links so the system
thinks they are the OpenGL libraries by typing:

% ln -s libMesaGL.so libGL.so
% ln -s libMesaGLU.so libGLU.so

Then you can set the environment variable LD_LIBRARY_PATH to
be the directory where you installed the libraries:

% setenv LD_LIBRARY_PATH /some/directory/here

does it with csh (tcsh).

After that, just set your DISPLAY and any GL program, even the pre-built
demos, will run anywhere without needing to recompile it. This is slower
than using GL, but it is good for times when you don't have enough time to
justify getting over to sweet hall, but just want to work for a few
minutes.